It is officially begins

Salam,

My first day of fieldwork officially began yesterday. Out of 24 measurements, I only managed to do 8. It was so hot outside, 42 celcius. Since the time frame that is allowed for me to do the measurements is around 11am to 1pm, and 3pm to 4pm (hottest time of the day!!), I began at 12pm (after helping my advisor's another student to assemble her weather station) and decided to stop at 3pm considering the heat that almost burned my head. 

When I got home, I immediately took a shower while I should have wait my body temperature to decrease. As a consequence, I could feel the burning in my head, especially that I showered my head first, (macam api menyala-nyala disiram air) and got headache afterwards! First day is always tiring, not only that I worn out, but I slept from 4.30pm to 6.30pm, and fell asleep before 12 am last night. Owh, and I drank at least 2 liter of water when I was out at the field (none was removed, so just imagine the hotness).

Starting from yesterday onwards, until the first or second week of September, I will spend at least 2 weeks/month collecting data for my research. My goal this year is to process and analyze my data when not taking any measurements, yet based upon my experience last year, it is not an easy thing to do. It took me a day or two to recover myself from the fieldwork, and by that time, I had to start the new cycle of measurement again. But, if I really want to graduate by next August, I just have to push myself :(

Well, last but not least, I started my fieldwork at 56.8kg. Last year, my weight went to 49.8kg by September. I really have to lose at least 5kg, considering that my flabby stomach starts to build up. * Fingers crossed*

The worst nightmare

Salam,

I am worried sick.

 

 Normal / healthy looking cotton plants.

 Stunted plants in my experimental plots caused by extreme drought. Some of the seeds has failed to emerge, despite plenty of irrigation has been applied. Last rain in Lubbock was in October. (Now I totally understand why rain is such a bless!)

In spite of the state of art in technologies that we are proud (arrogant) of, we are so powerless when it comes to the mother nature that He, the Glorious Almighty, has created.

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Promo filem

Salam,

Dah 2 hari otak saya jammed, baca buku pon tak masuk, nak buat modeling pon dah kering idea. Konon-kononnya utk melegakan otak, saya paksa Imran bawak saya tengok wayang X Men : First Class. Kami pon p lah drive-in movie, bayar $6 dapat tengok 2 sekaligus. Oleh sebab tanak membazir (satu lagi sebab kenapa saya ended up tengok movies banyak sgt), cerita X Men tu start pukul 12 am, terpaksa la tengok cerita Green Lantern yang agak sengal-sengal itu (sila lah jangan tengok cerita one man show macam Rambo nie, bosan gila). 

Gambar ikhsan pakcik Google

Siapa yang pernah tengok sequel X Men sebelum nie, saya rasa First Class nie lah yang terbaik so far. Owh rasa tak boleh tido malam tengok Charles Xavier and Magneto muda-muda (Kalau pernah tengok cerita Narnia, actor Prof X nie ialah Mr Tumnus yang berkaki kuda tu). Prequel nie elaboratekan;

1. Macamana Erik (Magneto) jadi luar biasa jahat
2. Siapa yang jaga Raven (Mystique) dari kecil n macamana dia ended up jadi geng Magneto
3. Sape yang cipta cerebro and super sonic airplane tu
4. Saya suspect Alex tu ialah Scott muda-muda, hmm
5. Macamana Prof X boleh paralyzed (kenapa perlu dia paralyzed jaman muda-muda huhu)

Kesimpulannya, X Men memang lagi best dari Pirate of Carribean: On Stranger Tides. Johnny Depp macam dah hilang touch, tak gile-giler sangat pon, nak harap mermaid cantek Syrena tu aje. Agaknya bila dah banyak sequel pelakon yang sama, boring makcik menontonnya. Ada sesiapa dah tengok Kungfu Panda 2? (Imran cepat-cepat geleng tak mahu tengok kartun!!!)



Waktu kritikal

Salam,

Waktu paling kritikal utk stay awake ialah pukul 3 pm, selepas lunch spicy catfish and shrimp tomyum, pulak tu kena buat heavy reading dekat library yang suhunya sangat melalaikan. *fingers crossed*

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Golden Gate, San Fran.

Salam,

Saya tade mood nak menulis. Budak Serbia yang perangainya memang macam Serbia tu, kerja duk mengutuk-ngutuk orang kat lab (Dia sebut pasal orang Korea la Asian la apa-apa aje la). Saya malas nak dengar, nanti saya sakit hati. Saya plan nak berambus dari lab sekejap lagi, cari tempat lain untuk baca buku. Silalah tengok gambar saje (Gambar tak banyak).

(Tetiba rasa nak selit gambar sendiri)

How many hours a grad student should work in a day?

Salam,

Personally, I don't think a grad student should sleep and eat and live in his/her lab or graduate lab. Shouldn't we allocate at least couple of hours (per day or per week?) for ourselves, as pursuing a PhD life can be challenging enough to maintain our sanity. I wonder how many hours per day my colleagues spend on research or studying related works. Well, those do not include FB-ing or blogging (started to feel guilty myself, as I spent some times (usually less than an hour) reading gossips and ridiculous political shenanigans from home country, but again, I need to keep my wisdom, I have a husband to be entertained at home. I am not into blog hopping, tweeter or FB that much, but unfortunately I am addicted to TV series – Glee, Good Housewife, The Simpsons).

The most hours I can work is 10 (plus an hour of lunch, prays, blogging etc) and the least is none at all (Well, this only happens on Sunday, bear in mind, I have a husband (Kelab Isteri Taat says I to have to keep entertain him). I only have two schedules, which are,

1. Go to campus around 10 am, work until 2 pm, go home for cooking, lunch, pray etc. Go back to campus right after the lunch break and continue to work from 3pm to 8 pm.

2. Everything is the same as the previous, but with an exception, which is after the lunch hour. Instead of going back to school, I take a nap sleep until I hardly sleep anymore (this can take up to 2-3 hours). Work some more during nights, but with Imran watches TV, I can concentrate for only an hour or two (the TV is next to my study table!). Fortunately, this one happens less, less frequently than the previous one.

When I started the program about 3 years ago, my motivation was to the fullest that I could stay at campus and studied for 12 hours. I could study without any distraction for straight 6 hours (no food or break). Plus, I shared my apartment during that time that it wasn’t a great, comfortable place to study. When Imran joined me a year later, the studying hours perhaps reduced at least to half. It took me a semester to recover, considering that I took 12-13 credit hours for two semesters (average is 9) and my brain was totally desperate for a break. Sometimes I wonder, where did I gain the motivation to study like a freak during that time, because now, there is urgency for me to be in that non-sanity state again. I feel that I should work more and more and more, but how many hours I should really spend?

Productivity

Salam,

The easiest way to measure daily productivity:

Jot down the works that you plan to finish in a day, by the end of that day, tick the works that you have successfully executed.

Plan for works that are managable within a day, don't be too ambitious to jot down all the research works that you should do in a year. It can end up with a negative productivity and watching the Glee ^_^

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Hearst Castle, CA

Salam,

Saya memang bercita-cita tak nak add captions kat gambar-gambar nie. Alasan kukuh saya: kena study modeler language, betulkan literature review and compare model component calculations hehehe. Siapa yang rajin nak tahu pasal Hearst Castle nie, sila klik http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hearst_Castle
 
Sikit saje yang saya nak inform, tuan punya castle nie bercita-cita untuk build something little selepas duduk dalam khemah bertahun-tahun. Something little?
 

Owh kaler gold kat dinding yang anda nampak tu, tiles tu sebenarnya disalut dengan gold hehehe. Masih something little?

Kisah statistik

Salam,

Sape suka statistic sila angkat tangannnnnnnnnnnnnnnn!!!!! (Saya angkat tangan tinggi-tinggi). Semenjak study agronomy nie, sekejap-sekejap statistic, sekejap-sekejap statistic, sampai tahap nak sorok tangan bawah meja huhu.

Bila time kena start test model, saya dah pening kepala. Model tu ialah linear regression line, so ada slope n intercept. SV kata, buat t-test asing-asing, mula-mula test slope dulu lepas tu kalau takde significant different, baru test intercept. Kalau intercept pon tak berbeza statistically, then model tu ok. Saya pon test-test, semua slopes and intercepts tak significantly different, mulalah excited, siap lompat-lompat.

Tiba-tiba pulak, committee member yang terer statistic kata, bukan macam tu. Kena test slope and intercept tu serentak guna F test. Saya pon susah hati, dah siap boleh bajet outcomenya, jadi selepas test ikut kata committee member, sah!! model tu significantly different!! Saya bertambah susah hati (Maknanya kena repeat modelling?? Tidak mahu!!!)

Bila cakap dengan SV, SV kata, saya tade masalah pon publish journal dengan cara saya test tu. Sudah, saya sudah pening, rasa mahu guling-guling. Kata Cody kawan saya, tulis saje value untuk dua-dua tests tu, suruh saje depa pilih mana yang depa mahu percaya. Statistic nie, banyak sangat 'trick'nya, kadang-kadang susah nak faham (ini bukan statisctic pasal mean, median). Kata Mark Twain (sape tak tahu Mark Twain sila google  ^_^);

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."

Siapa setuju, sila angkat tangan!! (Saya angkat tangan tinggi-tinggi sekali lagi) hehehe

The Crookedest Lane, San Francisco

Salam,

Saya decided nak update pictures p San Fran nie secara random saje. Sebenarnya, saya tak upload lagi gambar-gambar saya SD card saya, walaupun dah dekat 3 minggu balik trip. Kebetulan, camera adik saya rosak, SD card saya pulak dah penuh tahap maximum. Oleh kerana saya kena pos SD card nie kembali kepada tuannya, maka semalam tergopoh -gopoh copy. Saya tak kuasa nak edit bagai, jadi silalah tengok gambar original orang yang jenis hanya ketik-ketik camera hehehe. Saya tak larat juga nk buat caption, sebab kerja research menunggu-nunggu hehe

Owh, FYI, saya berjaya naik ke atas, secara berlari hahahaha (sebab diberi masa 20 min saje kat spot nie) tapi lepas tu sesak nafas usahlah cakap hehehe.